Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by SamSpade »

No food club in former Unified stores supplied by SuperValu that I've seen.

I was just in a New Seasons. It appears their preference is:
Own label when possible
Wild Harvest. If unavailable, Essential Everyday may be substitute (in paper you can get one 'Shoppers Value' item)
CADIA"

*Not technically a store brand but largely filling in that category at NSM.

I don't know if they use KeHe or UNFI for their "natural" items.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by SamSpade »

Market of Choice:
All Natural Directions offerings marked with green plastic over the shelf tags. Replaced with Wild Harvest in same product as depleted.

I will say that Wild Harvest packaging in canned and boxed goods looks "better" (stood out more) than Natural Directions.

Western Family being replaced with Essential Everyday.

MoC is more focused on regional, "natural," and specialty groceries but as the name implies, does allow for quite a bit of Choice.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by storewanderer »

SamSpade wrote: August 11th, 2018, 12:13 pm Market of Choice:
All Natural Directions offerings marked with green plastic over the shelf tags. Replaced with Wild Harvest in same product as depleted.

I will say that Wild Harvest packaging in canned and boxed goods looks "better" (stood out more) than Natural Directions.

Western Family being replaced with Essential Everyday.

MoC is more focused on regional, "natural," and specialty groceries but as the name implies, does allow for quite a bit of Choice.
It appears Supervalu is cutting ties with Topco and bringing in their own brands (no surprise). Wild Harvest always had good packaging.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by wyoretailman »

Before I starting for the competitor here in Casper, WY I noticed that Ridley's Family Markets was changing over from Western Family to Food Club. I know Ridleys is serviced by Associated.

Seeing this brand brought back memories of shopping at CityMarket with my mom in Rawlins, WY (a Dillion's banner and now a Kroger banner) and Dillions in Wellington, KS. Along with other brands like TopFrost and I think TopCrest, FoodClub was a store that my mom often bought.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by storewanderer »

Food Club is a fairly comprehensive private label program. TopCo clearly starved Western Family in an effort to kill the line off by cutting its SKUs, eliminating it on household items in place of Simply Done (bleh) or Top Care. I suspect the fatal blow to Western Family continuing as a label was when Supervalu decided to start pushing its own labels in CA, OR, WA, etc. and the independents switched over to those labels in mass and few kept Western Family. AFS and its customers really pushed Western Family strongly though and seeing it go away there is a bit strange.

Western Family fell behind the past few years as they were shutting things down, it too was once very comprehensive. I did like the Western Family brand as it was such a fixture at these small chains/independents all over for so many years, and felt the label had decent quality (I know others disagree on this). However, in going to a few NorCal Unified independents the past month or so and doing an objective walkthrough of their stores, which were remerchandised to add in Supervalu brands and clearance out all of the old WF/Topco stuff, the private label situation in the stores looks a lot better now, than it did before. The Essential Everyday, Wild Harvest, Equaline, and Culinary Circle items have better packaging, a better item assortment, and just appear to be more up with the current times.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by SamSpade »

Discovered a blog post by URM Stores that notes that both they and Associated Foods decided to align with Topco due to the SuperValu / United Stores merger (which of course is now held by UNFI).
http://www.urmstores.com/about-us/exclu ... ransition/
The plan was to transition throughout 2018 so it should be complete now.

I didn't look too closely while visiting the Hood River, Ore. Rosauers yesterday, but I definitely remember seeing Food Club's newer green logo.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by jamcool »

Does SuperValu/UNFI still offer the Springfield brand in CA?
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by storewanderer »

jamcool wrote: May 20th, 2019, 12:22 pm Does SuperValu/UNFI still offer the Springfield brand in CA?
Yes, Springfield is still being offered on dry grocery categories. It will be interesting to see how long it lasts.

Wild Harvest, Equaline, and other old Albertsons, Inc. friends are all present in other categories in SoCal. The Springfield mix is pretty limited and it is not getting new items added like it should be. I am sure the brand lives on borrowed time. Many of the independents in SoCal have their own private labels on high frequency categories now (Superior, Northgate, Cardenas) which does not help the case for keeping the Springfield brand going.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by storewanderer »

storewanderer wrote: May 21st, 2019, 9:04 pm
jamcool wrote: May 20th, 2019, 12:22 pm Does SuperValu/UNFI still offer the Springfield brand in CA?
Yes, Springfield is still being offered on dry grocery categories. It will be interesting to see how long it lasts.

Wild Harvest, Equaline, and other old Albertsons, Inc. friends are all present in other categories in SoCal. The Springfield mix is pretty limited and it is not getting new items added like it should be. I am sure the brand lives on borrowed time. Many of the independents in SoCal have their own private labels on high frequency categories now (Superior, Northgate, Cardenas) which does not help the case for keeping the Springfield brand going.
Springfield is in the process of being discontinued in SoCal at Unified/Supervalu/UNFI/? Replaced with Essential Everyday.
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Re: Western Family being replaced by Food Club at Associated Food Stores??

Post by storewanderer »

storewanderer wrote: September 25th, 2019, 10:24 pm

Springfield is in the process of being discontinued in SoCal at Unified/Supervalu/UNFI/? Replaced with Essential Everyday.
I went back to some of these independents today and I am not so sure Springfield is being discontinued. It appears items are still being sourced with this label, as I got items with expiration dates out to 2023 in a few instances. But what is odd is the items they still have. Black Pepper is Springfield, but Salt is Essential Everyday. Plastic cutlery is Essential Everyday, but multiple SKUs of plastic cups are Springfield. Also all Charcoal is still Springfield. Sugar/flour is Essential Everyday but Baking Soda with 2021 expiration is still Springfield. Canned vegetables are all Essential Everyday but canned fruits are still Springfield...

Maybe they just have a lot of packaging to use up... it would kind of explain the items.
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